Posts Tagged ‘a fool and his wealth are soon parted’

Yes, “there is more to life than money.” Also important, “a fool and his money are soon parted.”

So be aware of the possibility of being foolish about wealth. Be aware of the possibility of being foolish about all of life or any of it. Then be aware of the possibility of being calm and clear and courageous about life, including the aspect of life regarding wealth.

Lately, many people are talking about financial risk and results that they have called surprising. Many of them have been investing their trust in mass media or massive bureaucracies like the insurance company AIG or the Federal Reserve or the government of the USSR- you thought I was going to say US, didn’t you?

What have been the consequences of investing trust in the mass media and massive bureaucracies? Have those results (perhaps such as being unpleasantly surprised) raised the question as to whether those methods might have been foolish? Is it possible that foolish methods of investing trust may produce the result of financial losses, rather like the saying goes that “a fool and his money are soon parted?”

What about discounting the importance of financial realities? Are finances suddenly important to you or were they always important and only recently recognized as important? How about this: are gasoline or electricity suddenly important to you or were they always important and only recently recognized as important because we could take them for granted until prices reached a point that we altered our perspective and our behavior based on things like rising gasoline prices.

For many years, I have been focusing on the possibility of rising fuel prices and their consequences on the economies of Japan, the USSR, Europe, and the US. My publication in 2004 of “the Real US Deficit: OIL” featured a section called “the DominOIL effect” relating to why I expected fuel prices to continue their dramatic rise that began in 1999 and what consequences I expected in the US, which I expected to be similar to what had been happening in Japan since 1989 and the UK and EU since 1999.

The next chart shows the all-time low of inflation-adjusted prices of gasoline in the US in 1999. Global oil prices also made a major low in 1999.

The last chart is a chart of the stock market of the UK. Next, here is what gas prices in the US were near the time of that article in 2004:

Some people have questioned my logic because of oil and gasoline prices falling sharply in 2008. However, for those that have the courage to read my old articles, I did not say that demand for fuel would never drop or that prices would never drop.

On the contrary, I simply said that diminishing supplies (since the easily predictable peaking of global oil production in 2006) would raise prices enough to slow down the global economy, including that of the US. That predictable slowing of economic activity would predictably reduce demand for fuel, which would predictably drop prices. The drop in 2008 does not disprove the accuracy of the logic, but establish it. I may have even published all of that content, but it is pretty easy to see the logic one’s self if one is willing and able to face the simple facts.

How can the global economy expand after the 2006 peak in oil production? It must contract. Economic activity drops as fuel supply drops. Things like currency inflation or credit deflation are secondary financial measures relative to a primary tangible economic issue like an empty fuel tank in your car. Having lots of cash or credit but being out of gas in the middle of a desolate highway do not make a fool into a genius. Primary functional economic tangibles like gasoline and food are the things that we value having currency to access. No one cares much about currency (or gold) when they are starving, right?

So, it was the spiking of fuel prices by 2007 that were accompanied by the steep decline of global stock prices in 2008. After stocks began to plummet, fuel prices did too eventually- all as I predicted. Further, real estate borrowing had predictably diminished considerably as well, so real estate prices predictably declined dramatically, which resulted in financial trouble for many financial institutions, such as FNMA, AIG, and WaMu, as I specifically predicted in a video that has been online since 2006. (I can send a link to those interested.)

Once fuel prices fell, the global stock market began to recover. However, gasoline prices in the US recently approached their 2008 highs again (in red below).

In 2007, stocks peaked while gasoline (and silver) rose. Then silver peaked next in early 2008), then gasoline. Doesn’t that imply that rising fuel prices may have been the cause of the decline in prices of stocks (in the US and globally) and even of silver? Or maybe it was the high silver prices that brought down everything, right? ;)

When gasoline prices in the US reached a high enough level in April to reverse the spending behavior of the US economy, dropping demand enough to reduce purchases and bring down gasoline prices. However, that reduction in a fundamental behavior within the US economy also brought down the prices of the US stock market (blue above) and even of silver (green above).

In fact, those three things peaked on the exact same day: April 29th, 2011 (close-up shown below). But no one could have predicted that rising gasoline prices would have in any way effected the US economy or spending habits or stock prices or even silver prices, right? Rising fuel prices could not really have any effect on popping bubbles of speculative mania, would they?

Then again, maybe the cause was President Bush or President Obama, not gasoline prices. Or maybe they are personally responsible for gasoline prices- like maybe whether the prices of gasoline rise or fall is totally dependent on the choices of exactly one person.

But why did the Japanese economy slow down in 1989? Why did European economies begin to slow in 1999? Did $11 gallons of diesel in the UK in 2008 have any effect on the spending behaviors and economic activities of business and consumers within the UK?

Possible? Yes.

Predictable? Yes!

So, what is coming next? More selling of stocks and real estate. I’ve been warning of that since before 2004. I knew that the speculative bubbles would not last forever and were nearing their extremes. Real estate began peaking in 2005 (in places like Phoenix) and soon extended to most of the US (and much of Europe etc). Stocks began peaking in the US in 2007 (at least for most sectors, excluding high tech, which peaked several years prior).

Of course there were a few exceptions, like the US stock sector HUI (shown above). However, the mining stocks of HUI are part of the same economy, too. They actually peaked in early April this year (pink):

What has done well? Here are a few examples of gains approaching 100% gains in the last 10 days:

What else did well lately? I sold a put option for $1.07 today that closed Friday at $.17. That change (up over 400%) is a pretty decent increase for a single day, right?

But remember, the mass media and massive bureaucracies may indicate that there is no such thing as predictability, or at least not in certain instances. Even notice that as you are reading this sentence, there is absolutely no way to predict that this sentence is going to end with a punctuation mark, is there?

No one could have predicted any of this. The future is completely unrelated to the past- not just your personal future, but even the future of how this sentence is going to end.

Nature does not have any patterns in it. And that, as always, is entirely the fault of the US President. Or the Federal Reserve. Or OPEC. Or this sentence.

So how are we going to fix the problem of nature not having any predictable patterns in it? First, let’s blame someone else because that has always worked marvelously in the past, right? Then let’s wait for the person that we blame to save us from them. Finally, let’s complain about how waiting for them to save us from them is still not working again as usual as always.

Just do not adjust. After all, adjusting could effect your actual results, and no one is interested in financial security or economic prosperity because that would be evil and shameful and of no functional relevance whatsoever. So, is any of this fooling you?

Keep in mind that sometimes translations can shift the implication of a message. If someone were to suggest that proudly foolish naivete about financial speculative bubbles was a major risk, deserving great caution, do you think that message might be translated like this: “proud attachment to ideals about wealth is dangerous” or even “the love of money is the root of all evil?”

It’s not ignorance that is most risky. It is believing that something is so when in fact it is not.

From an emotional or irrational attachment to false presumptions, blame and anger and grief and agonizing and proud argumentativeness and shame all may arise predictably. Learn that, either the easy way or the hard way, but learn it fast.

By the way, yesterday at the close of trading (Monday 8/8/2011), I purchased some call options on the US Stock market. Those positions rise in value when stock prices rise. After one of the biggest down days in US stocks in decades, I understood that the panic of the masses after the weekend downgrade of US debt could be a short-term buy signal for US stocks.

So, after stock futures dropped another 2% in overnight trading, they then reversed 4% and are again pushing toward an open of more than 2% up. That should produce overnight gains of well over 100% for those instruments.

UPDATE:

I sold those call options for a gain of only 40% overnight. But that was just the start of the day. It got better…..